The next big business trend that we are going to see, and that is happening already, is not only that aboriginal businesses are going to be stronger components of the corporate supply chain, but we are also going to see them as stronger proponents of equity positions and actual partners within resource projects.

JP Gladu of the Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business discusses native participation in resource industries...Read More

Uranium news from Saskatchewan and elsewhere for October 5 to 11, 2013

Having mostly conducted barge drilling east of their Patterson Lake South discovery, Fission Uranium TSXV:FCU and Alpha Minerals TSXV:AMW now plan to head west with a $2.25-million, 11-hole, 3,700-metre, land-based expansion to their current campaign. The 50/50 joint venture partners will take advantage of their buoyant financing as lake conditions change with the season.

Previous drilling on the area between 360 and 860 metres west of the R00E zone showed clay alteration, anomalous radioactivity and elevated uranium results, according to the companies’ October 7 announcements. The area has also undergone electromagnetic and DC resistivity mapping, as well as a more recent RadonEx survey. The latter found anomalous radon levels north of the PL-3B EM conductor, an intriguing find since R00E zone mineralization has been situated consistently north of the same conductor.

A successful summer of exploration and financing motivated Alpha and Fission to expand their current Patterson Lake South campaign.

Two days after that announcement, the JV reported results from the opposite side of PLS, the eastern-most hole of the eastern-most zone. And while finding new superlatives for the project can’t always be easy, the partners aren’t without inspiration. This time they say scintillometer readings show “the largest accumulation of mineralized intervals in any drill hole at PLS to date.”

The results come from a hand-held device that measures drill core gamma ray particles in counts per second up to a maximum off-scale reading of over 9,999 cps. Scintillometer results are no substitute for assays, which will follow.

Drilled to a total depth of 368 metres, PLS13-099 found the basement unconformity at 59.8 metres without encountering sandstone. The results show:

True widths weren’t available. With a dip of -88 degrees, downhole depths are close to vertical.

This is the fourth of four holes sunk so far in zone R945E, which parallels the PL-3B conductor and coincides with the project’s strongest radon-in-water anomaly. The hole extends the strike length by 15 metres to 1.035 kilometres.

Forsys Metals’ TSX:FSY Norasa project in Namibia moved closer to production with a resource update announced October 7. The news release provided separate cutoff grades of 0.01% for the Valencia deposit and 0.016% for the Namibplaas deposit, but combined the tonnage and contained pounds for both deposits. The resource shows:

a measured category of 17 million tonnes averaging 0.02% for 7 million pounds uranium oxide (U3O8)

an indicated category of 221 million tonnes averaging 0.019% for 96 million pounds

an inferred category of 50 million tonnes averaging 0.019% for 22 million pounds

Both deposits remain open along strike and at depth, the company stated.

The project has a reserve estimate scheduled for Q1 2014 release and feasibility for Q3. Assuming positive results, funding and other hurdles are cleared, the company hopes to begin construction late next year and start commercial open pit production in Q2 2016.

Along with JV partner Fission, Azincourt Uranium TSXV:AAZ announced airborne VTEM results from their PLS-adjacent Patterson Lake North project on October 8. Conductive basement rocks trending north-south for eight kilometres on the property’s northern section represent “the possible extension of the Saskatoon Lake Conductor system which hosts the Shea Creek uranium deposits,” the companies stated. Additional data is now being gathered through a ground magnetotelluric survey.

Still to come is a ground EM survey for the central part of the property to target a conductive metasedimentary belt that coincides with a structural offset at the unconformity. On the project’s southern area, another ground EM survey will follow up on a prospective trend parallel to the PLS discovery. The team has also collected 16 outcrop and 56 soil samples, and re-logged historic core.

Following up on last winter’s drilling, Purepoint Uranium TSXV:PTU plans to sink more Hook Lake holes, focusing on the same conductive trend that hosts the PLS discovery about five kilometres away. EM surveying has identified three prospective structural corridors, each with multiple conductors, Purepoint added. The program will consist of about 5,000 metres with a $2.5-million budget, according to an October 8 announcement. But it wasn’t clear whether those numbers include previous work.

Under an agreement announced October 8, Aldrin Resource TSXV:ALN will buy the 49,275-hectare Virgin property, three contiguous blocks around the Basin’s south-central rim. One of them sits adjacent to Cameco’s Centennial property. The deal has Aldrin paying $75,000 and issuing a total of five million shares to four vendors who retain a 3% NSR or, should the property produce diamonds, a 3% gross overriding royalty on the gems. A similar diamond provision was part of Aldrin’s 70% PLS-adjacent Triple M acquisition from the same vendors last April.

Aldrin also announced a private placement offering up to 10 million units at $0.10 for gross proceeds of $1 million. Each unit consists of one share and one warrant exercisable at $0.20 for a year. Proceeds will go to Triple M exploration and general working capital.